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Trees provide surprising economic value

Urban forestry planner Sara Rowland spoke to Green Drinks Sarnia about the economic value of trees on Jan. 14 at the Limbo Lounge. Rowland spoke about the many monetary and health benefits brought about by planting trees. CARL HNATYSHYN/SARNIA THIS WEEK/QMI AGENCY

The trees that line our city streets and towns aren’t simply vessels that provide shade on a hot day and places for birds to nest. They also have an inherent and often overlooked economic value that municipalities are only beginning to realize the importance of.

London, Ontario’s Urban Forestry Planner Sara Rowland supported that assertion during her presentation to a small but rapt audience at Green Drinks Sarnia on Jan. 14. Green Drinks is a monthly social gathering and informal discussion forum that deals with local, national and international environmental issues.

During her hour-long presentation, Rowland outlined the numerous and significant economic benefits of planting trees, including increased property values, a decrease in the amount of money spent on health care, significant saving on energy bills and prevention of soil erosion to name a few.

“Realty values probably increase by about 10 to 20 percent with the presence of well placed, well grown, well cared for trees,” she said. “They also provide storm water management benefits by intercepting water and preventing it from causing sheet erosion of soils and diminished water quality at the river.”

In terms of health benefits, Rowland pointed to a 2008 City of London report that found that the Forest City’s tree-lined streets brought benefits like cleaning the air in neighbourhoods, reducing visits to the hospital by asthma sufferers and clearing out and filtering the dust and pollutants from cars.

“It’s very hard to quantify, but we’ve estimated it to be worth about $4.5 million per year in the city of London alone,” she said. “The savings come in terms of avoided health care cost through people getting better when they’re in hospital, not needing prescriptions, not needing to visit the doctor or hospital as much because of the benefits provided by trees in terms of keeping the air clean and enabling us to breathe more healthily.”

“Human health benefits are often overlooked, but it’s true that we need trees to be healthy,” Rowland continued.

Rowland gave tangible evidence about the affect of trees on human health by discussing the example of the emerald ash borer, which since coming to North America a little over a decade ago has wreaked havoc on tens of millions of ash trees across the continent.

“There’s good empirical evidence coming out of the United States now with the emerald ash borer and the impact that’s having on the population of ash trees. It’s already being measured in terms of early death in the human population. So we do know that there’s a definite tie there,” she said.

Reduced energy bills are also a side effect of having a healthy, well-maintained abundance of trees in your neighbourhood and on your property, she said. Millions of dollars in energy costs per year have been saved by London’s pronounced presence of trees, Rowland said, as they reduce reliance on air conditioning in the summer and on heating during the winter.

Rowland then introduced the audience to a website, itreetools.org, that allows people anywhere in North America the ability to calculate the savings accrued by trees on their property. She also modeled the Trunk Forward Method, a technique of tree appraisal used in North America, which assigns specific trees dollar values.

As for what a person can do to benefit economically from this somewhat hidden forest economy, Rowland said that the solution was a simple one.

“Plant a tree,” Rowland said with a smile. “I’d like to see more people planting trees and planting big shade trees.”

The savings that you get from planting a tree won’t come overnight, Rowland warned. But if people and governments begin planting more trees, the tangible benefits will be evident down the road. And for those worried about the potential downsides of planting a tree, worry no more, she said.

“A lot of people I speak to, if they’re choosing a tree they somehow imagine that the tree will grow to these enormous dimensions overnight. But you won’t be living there by then,” she said. “The average person lives in a home for seven years before they move to another one. A tree lives for 150 years, so there are 20 different people moving into the house over the tree’s lifetime.”

“Don’t be afraid about how big it will grow, because you probably won’t be around to worry about it,” she said. “But for now plant the very best tree you can, and that’s a relatively fast growing, relatively big tree.”

Rowland said that she was buoyed by the growing awareness of the economic benefits that trees bring to a community, particularly among younger generations.

“I’ve done quite a few talks on different topics to school kids, and when I put the question out there…they never start with ‘oh, it’s just wood and it’s worth wood value for firewood, carpentry wood or lumber or for building houses’,” she said. “That never comes up. It’s always all of the other values first. The human health values, the biodiversity and the fact that the trees provide medicine,” Rowland said, giving the example of the bark and leaves of the Yew tree being used to make Taxol, a cancer-fighting drug.

“So the kids are amazingly well versed on what trees do for us. The teachers are doing a grand job there. They tell me, I don’t have to tell them,” she said.

Developing that awareness in adults, and particularly our elected officials, has been a significantly slower process Rowland said.

“I think it will be (a bigger priority) when a study comes out that shows that human life expectancy in Lambton County has been reduced since trees were lost. Usually politicians listen well when it’s a human impact like that, that they can tangibly interpret,” she said. “Environmental priorities always cease to be a priority when there’s something else, be it health care, education, need for roads, job creation, the environmental stuff is always on the back burner,” she said. Looking at her own city, Rowland was cautiously optimistic that the elected officials there were beginning to realize that the actions that they take now will resonate and affect future generations.

“I think our council (in London) is more forward thinking now…I think there’s more discussion going on behind the scenes about the need to address the big picture items of climate change, which will cover multiple political generations.”

“It’s not going to be solved in a four-year term. They have to be thinking 40 years ahead, and they have to be making decisions today that will impact that council and that community and the taxpayer 40 years from now,” she said.

“It’s a long term legacy.”

To find out how much money your trees are saving you, visit www.itreetools.org and go to the iTree design option from the application menu.